The Blog

As I write this, I look at your sleeping face Esther and I realise, as I do every minute of every day, how much I love you and your brother.

How proud and emotional I feel as I watch you both learn and grow. I think about the state of the world I have birthed you into and I feel sad and overwhelmed.

But then I look closer, at my world that I have helped build and I feel strengthened. There is so much love here it just does not shout as loudly as the hate out there.

It is quiet, calm but it is there. I can feel it.

I feel it when I am let across the road by a stranger for no reason at all, just pure kindness. I feel it when my friends write words that take them a few seconds but make my day a better and happier place. I feel it when your Dad says ‘don’t do your work this afternoon, have a bath or a sleep’. I feel it so strongly every day doing the job that I do.

Birth is the most powerful and incredible experience that we journey on. We discover who we are through this amazing and life changing event. We are reborn and rise like a phoenix from the ashes. We are newborn ourselves as we hold our newborn infants in our arms.

But it can also be the cause of pain and sadness. The other side of the coin. A wrongly handled birth can cause a woman to live the rest of her life with traumatic images and unanswered questions in her head. ‘Why didn’t they listen, why was I not treated well?’

This is exactly why I teach Hypnobirthing. To change the world one birth at a time. As my friend and co-teacher Ray said the other day, ‘not building an army here, just one woman at a time!’

I seek to make the birthing world a better place for you. I want you to birth your children into a world that understands how powerful and capable you are. How incredible and awesome your body is. I want you both to understand and see this too.

I want you to live in a world where there is mutual respect and understanding between science and nature. A world where sometimes, especially where birth is concerned, nature is given power and reign.

I hope and plan for a world where your caregivers are kind. Your midwives are as gentle as mine were. That you are listened to, and helped to achieve your wishes. I ask that anyone who reads this helps me achieve this.

We all need to make changes. Learn and enlighten ourselves about how our bodies work, about how amazing we truly are. Do not believe the liars, out for profit, that whisper that your body is not good enough, that it doesn’t work without help. Think about what you say, how you give advice and make the end goal, love.

Speak up for rights, and kindness, honour the truth and be honest about your feelings, dreams and worries. Do not hide them away as future birthing women (and the men that journey with them) can learn from this. Invest in yourself whether that is money, importance, or time. If YOU think you are worthy enough to do this you will help your children to see how much worth they have. What a lesson to pass onto our future!

Esther, and Felix too, I love you and hope that you live in a better world, one that continues to improve and learn. I know I do everything in my power to make sure that this happens and I know a hell of a lot of people who do the same everyday.